Welcome to the third part of our series of how to make a wise appliance purchase and save significant money. I’ve already covered how to choose a reliable, feature rich appliance and how to use coupons and cash back offers. In this third installment, I’m going to cover two more important steps to save money when purchasing a new appliance: shopping around for the best deal (without too much work) and choosing the right time to buy.

3. Shop Around

Take the appliance model information and use a search tool to help you find a good price on your appliance. The best tool to use is Google shopping. Type your model number into Google Shopping to see the price comparison from several different stores. Especially look for stores that will take the Cash Back offers and/or Coupon offers that you discovered.

If you are a member of a warehouse club, check their website to see if they have any deals on the models you are looking for.

If you have more time than you have money: Call around to local appliance stores to find out if they have one of the models you are looking for in their scratch & dent / clearance / floor model inventory, and get a price to compare with everything else you have found.

Please remember not to get distracted by other models – stick with those models that have been tested and have proven reliable. Do not get suckered into buying another (perhaps similar) scratch & dent or floor model that isn’t a known quality or reliable performer.

Here’s a simple table to help you track some options for the total appliance cost:

4. Choose the right time to buy

If it is possible to time your appliance purchase then you should consider waiting until a prime purchasing opportunity arises. I realize that you may have a crisis and may not be able to wait. If so, that’s fine because if you follow the rest of the steps you’ll still save a lot of money!

If you can wait here are some of the best times to get appliance deals:

The weekends of Presidents Day, Columbus Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Independence Day and Thanksgiving. Check other holiday weekends for sales as well – the ones listed are the most common. Also, September & October tend to be better months – as new models are introduced, old models begin to be marked down.

Continuing on

There is one more installment in our series on how to save money on your purchase of a refrigerator, dryer, washing machine, dishwasher, and more! Proceed forward to the last installment in our series, how to save money through energy savings and energy rebates.